Words you should not use in ATC zones

[Geoff_H]

Words You Should Not Use copied from the latest Mooney magazine

“For” and “To” sound exactly like “four” and “two”. Used in the right combination of numbers, these

words can be confusing and lead to miscommunication. Here’s an example: “Center, Mooney 257KW climbing to one thousand.” You can see how this can be miscommunicated as 21,000 feet. How about

Mooney 257KW descending for 5000 (45,000 feet?). Instead, try to keep it simple, concise and understandable. “Denver Center, Mooney 257KW, four thousand two hundred, climbing one zero thousand."

[jackc]

Words You Should Not Use copied from the latest Mooney magazine

“For” and “To” sound exactly like “four” and “two”. Used in the right combination of numbers, these

words can be confusing and lead to miscommunication. Here’s an example: “Center, Mooney 257KW climbing to one thousand.” You can see how this can be miscommunicated as 21,000 feet. How about

Mooney 257KW descending for 5000 (45,000 feet?). Instead, try to keep it simple, concise and understandable. “Denver Center, Mooney 257KW, four thousand two hundred, climbing one zero thousand."

 

The main problem is too many pilots speak too quickly on the radio, same goes for some towers. Yes, it pays to keep communications short, but not at the expense of clarity. Just a student pilots observation:-)

[old man emu]

The key to good voice radio communication is the elimination of umms and arrhs. and the knowledge of what you are going to say. The phrases that we use, say during a session of circuits and bumps, are set out for us in many publications. We know that we are going to use these phrases, and when. What all student pilots should do is practise using the language of circuits while they are not actually flying. There's lots of spare time to practise while driving to the airfield.

 

When actually making a communication there are a few steps to follow:

1. Rehearse what you are going to say before you move on to the next steps.
   
2. Listen. Before you key the mike, listen to determine if anyone else is broadcasting. You don't want to cut out someone else's transmission. If you are flying at a controlled airport, the blokes in the tower will have you under observation, so they know where you are in the circuit. It's the other aircraft that you are really informing of your proposed actions.
   
3. Key the mike and pause. Some communication systems take a second or two to connect, so if you start talking immediately, you will "clip" your transmission.
   
4. Say your piece in a normal speaking voice. You are not singing the lyric to Chopin's Minute Waltz, nor do you need to drag each word out.
   
5. Know what you expect to hear back from other users. If you are receiving a clearance know how it will sound and what parts you need to confirm by a read-back.
   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qE9SVNAliUU

[Downunder]

Yes Geoff, one of biggest annoyances.

It caused the crash of a 747 in 1989.

 

ATC radioed to the flight, "Tiger 66, descend two four zero zero [2,400 ft], cleared for NDB approach runway 33." Captain Halpin, who heard "descend to four zero zero" replied with, "Okay, four zero zero" (meaning 400 ft above sea level, which was 2,000 ft too low)

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Tiger_Line_Flight_66

[Flightrite]

No one gets a clearance to 400', that's unheard of! A decent pilot would have questioned that cause it doesn't even make sense?

[turboplanner]

Yes Geoff, one of biggest annoyances.

It caused the crash of a 747 in 1989.

 

ATC radioed to the flight, "Tiger 66, descend two four zero zero [2,400 ft], cleared for NDB approach runway 33." Captain Halpin, who heard "descend to four zero zero" replied with, "Okay, four zero zero" (meaning 400 ft above sea level, which was 2,000 ft too low)

 

I've often seen on here the comment "It doesn't matter what you say as long as the other person understands it", and this is a classic example of how wrong that comment is. This was an NDB approach, so IFR flight and usually you don't know the cloud base until you'r right there. I've heard many fearful "No ground in sight" calls over the years, but those pilots were triggered for a missed approach.

 

The phrases also have to be correct for the jurisidiction you're flying in so that ATC nd the Pilot are both using the same phrases.

These phrases may be in clear conditions, of may be distant/in static/semi-failed equipment, so the syllables are just as important as the words. Perticularly around a circuit you can often pick what a pilot is doing by just hearing the static syllables, allowing an additional margin of safety.

 

In Australia we've had at least three generations of phonetic words and phrases, and some single additions.

So there is the very difficult problem of un-learning the previous set, re-learning the next, unlearning that and re-learning the current set along with the minor changes which have taken place in that.

 

Plenty of old pilots are still using the old terminology.

 

Some students have been using US books and lessons, which would be fine if they flew in the US, but not safe here.

 

We've also had UK variants used, as well as New Zealand variants.

 

And then there is the " it doesn't matter" group.

 

We need a clean-up in Australia, with all the reference material in one location.

Edited May 2, 2020 by turboplanner

[facthunter]

Re the 747, He should have been picked up on the readback. That's why you do it. ALL levels above around 10,000 ft (depending on QNH) are flight levels based on 1013.2 . Climb to two one zero is unambiguous . IF you eliminate to and for there's no harm done . Climb and descend says it all. You don't go below sector minimum s DME steps or final approach point heights or outside control areas unless cleared specifically. Nev.

[Flightrite]

Listening to the CVR it reads like a couple of amateurs are using a desk top flight SM! They get "pull up" warnings and don't even flinch! As professional pilots know the last line of defence IS the pilot!

[facthunter]

In all Company manuals you MUST act on a GPWS warning. Nev

[Flightrite]

In all Company manuals you MUST act on a GPWS warning. Nev

That's true unless it's a spurious warning and it's obvious of which happens at times. Reminds me of TE 901, imagine the surprise Collins and his crew got when they heard those words 'pull up'!

[facthunter]

You would need to be very sure it's a spurious warning. These manuals have to be watertight to keep the cowboys from ignoring them. "Thinking" pilots not wanted. If there's been a failure limiting your aircraft's performance you couldn't cancel the BL***y thing and it just increases your workload. It's probably saved enough HULLS to justify it's adoption. Nev

[M61A1]

The main problem is too many pilots speak too quickly on the radio,

I spend an awful lot of time wishing they would stick to the necessities and hurry up so someone else can make a timely transmission.

No one gets a clearance to 400', that's unheard of! A decent pilot would have questioned that cause it doesn't even make sense?

Even more so when the correct phraseology would have been "two thousand four hundred" or just "four hundred".

 

I heard an obviously non-English student the other day making clear concise radio broadcasts....shame his language was so bad I could not pick one useful piece of information from them.

[Garfly]

It's not only pilots who talk too fast.

 

Poor old Harrison is in strife again and I reckon it's not entirely his fault.

 

 

(Interesting debate in the comments but to see that you have to click through to watch on YouTube proper.)

[Garfly]

Talking about words that should or shouldn't be used; the transmission in this video at 05:04 caught my ear:

 

 

 

 

I'd thought that the word "takeoff" except when uttered by a controller giving a clearance and a pilot acknowledging one, had been made verboten by ICAO since the Tenerife enquiry. But from what I now read online, the phrase "Ready for takeoff" - as opposed to "... departure" or just "Ready" when I learned (in PNG back then) is taught and accepted in some parts of the US, nowadays, but not in others.

 

Some discussion here:

 

https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/26006/when-should-a-pilot-use-the-word-takeoff

 

Anyway, more to the point, this series of videos is very well made; fascinating for anyone with an interest in PNG and/or backcountry flying.

[jackc]

This is an interesting read....

 

https://www.pacdeff.com/pdfs/Communication%20Issues.pdf

[Jerry_Atrick]

I was at Elstree airport (North London) quite few years ago and they had a AFISO (sort of glorified radio operator) that was a real bar steward.. As I approached the hold, I called that I was ready for take-off. The can only issue a hold instruction and technically it is on behalf of the owner denying you permission to enter the runway... i.e. you can be done for tresspass. They can't issue ATC instructions such as line up, etc. They can, though, permit you to enter the runway conditionally, such as "after the PA28 on final has landed, take off at your discretion.."

 

Anyway, this pillock gave be a right old verbal belting about how it is departure and not take-off, and how I vioated CAP413 (FRTO Requirements).. I had hd enough of this pillock, so I resonded, "in accordance with CAP413, if one can't recall the correct phraseology, then one should use plain english to say what they need to." He muttered I could take off at my discretion.

[phantom1959]

It's not only pilots who talk too fast.

 

Poor old Harrison is in strife again and I reckon it's not entirely his fault.

 

 

(Interesting debate in the comments but to see that you have to click through to watch on YouTube proper.)

I reckon you're right there Garfly, when 9HU reported "holding short at Hotel" all the ATC had to do was acknowledge with the C/S or if busy - say nothing at all, the aircraft had stopped where he was told to and couldn't go any further without an onwards clearance.

If I were to say anything else I would have reiterated "Hold Position" but as soon as the ATC said "Continue.........." the opportunity arose for an error and the pilot ASSUMED he had a clearance to continue taxiing (across the rwy)

 

When I had ATC trainees I always hammered into them the importance of unambiguous phraseology!

One of the classics with one student (fortunately in the sim') was an aircraft called up saying " Centre, Speedbird 249 maintaining FL320, request climb to FL 340" the student replies "Speedbird 249 Climb to FL 340........................ (student thinking whilst looking at opposite direction traffic at FL 330 ) Not available"

I explained how this was sooooo dangerous! - All the pilot hears is "Climb to FL 340" the "Not available" 5 seconds later is missed!!

I drummed in to students to NEVER (ever) mention a level that you weren't going to assign!

Over the years have heard mountains of crap phraseology (and have been guilty at times of adding to that mountain!)

[Geoff_H]

Some 20 years ago I had an experience with "shotgun Sally" at Bankstown. I can't remember why, but I was entering the area from.a non standard approach. Then decided to fly to the standard approach point and report on arrival to that point. Well I accidentally called over the transmission of another aircraft. I thought that the controller, shotgun Sally, was calling me, she talked so quickly all that I could understand was the ending of her transmission was "qubeck", I was flying an aircraft that had a call sign ending in"qubeck". Well that slowed her rapid aircraft handing right down, did she give me a dressing down over the air. I was ever so cautious at that point. She gave me instructions to fly for a centre runway landing. In the following short time she must have changed the instruction to the left runway. I was certainly not answering any call that I was not sure of, so I never sent a confirmation reply. As I was on final descent I noticed a twin lining up on centre, I was confused and reluctant to report it owing to my earlier dressing down. The I got a very distinct instruction " clear to land on Left". I reported that I was on centre and given immediate go round. Things went normally after that. Some ATC official called me on my way home and said that they would be reporting me! Well after I replied to CASA with a written report saying that Shotgun Sally was difficult to understand and what had happened I never heard another thing. Not even that the issue was resolved or dropped.

I avoided Bankstown like the plague after that.

Geoff

[Student Pilot]

I used to work for a company based at Bankstown, there was an odd controller that got a bit stroppy but the bulk were very good. I found operating out of Bankstown, Moorabbin and Parafield (They called them secondary controlled airspace) to be no fuss compared to "Primary's". Experience is completely the opposite with the likes of Tamworth, Coffs Harbour and Albury.

They always seemed to make it hard and More complicated than it should be. Bankstown and Moorabbin in the hay-days of training were very busy compared to the likes of Tamworth and Coffs yet were so much easier to arrive and depart.

A phrase that always annoys me is "This time", it's just fluff. If you are going to say that you might as well say the actual time, an example is "XYZ taxing this time". There is no reason to use it.

[phantom1959]

Some 20 years ago I had an experience with "shotgun Sally" at Bankstown. I can't remember why, but I was entering the area from.a non standard approach. Then decided to fly to the standard approach point and report on arrival to that point. Well I accidentally called over the transmission of another aircraft. I thought that the controller, shotgun Sally, was calling me, she talked so quickly all that I could understand was the ending of her transmission was "qubeck", I was flying an aircraft that had a call sign ending in"qubeck". Well that slowed her rapid aircraft handing right down, did she give me a dressing down over the air. I was ever so cautious at that point. She gave me instructions to fly for a centre runway landing. In the following short time she must have changed the instruction to the left runway. I was certainly not answering any call that I was not sure of, so I never sent a confirmation reply. As I was on final descent I noticed a twin lining up on centre, I was confused and reluctant to report it owing to my earlier dressing down. The I got a very distinct instruction " clear to land on Left". I reported that I was on centre and given immediate go round. Things went normally after that. Some ATC official called me on my way home and said that they would be reporting me! Well after I replied to CASA with a written report saying that Shotgun Sally was difficult to understand and what had happened I never heard another thing. Not even that the issue was resolved or dropped.

I avoided Bankstown like the plague after that.

Geoff

Hi Geoff, thanks for your recollection!

Some people (like Shotgun) just don't get it at times - I understand when the sector/Tower/approach get busy but, those are the times that it is most important to be precise and, because it is busy, the ATC doesn't have time to say things twice.

That is when it is incumbent upon ATC to purposely slow down their delivery so the right message is delivered to the correct pilot!

If they don't do that the result is lots of "say agains" or "I missed that" or "was that for me?" all of which takes up valuable time.

 

For some years I worked the sector that encompasses Mangalore (YMNG) and as we have seen this year, it is a very busy and sometimes, a tragically dangerous bit of airspace.

When the work-load builds up there the opportunity to repeat transmissions disappears - as well as looking after Mangalore this sector also does arrivals and departures into Albury (so co-ord' with the tower) low level traffic into and out of Canberra (co-ord to Approach) plus all of the traffic into and out of YSWG

 

I have on many occasions instructed Asian students at YMNG to put the instructor on the radio (if there is one) because even though the students have supposedly passed the 'English Language' test, their skills are not really up to speed and I didn't have the time to repeat all of the traffic info etc.

 

If you have more than 2 or 3 aircraft doing air-work overhead the field in addition to other aircraft taxiing at YMNG plus on top of that, any hazard alerts, amended TAFS, SPECIS or new NOTAMS that have to be passed you can just imagine the congestion on the frequency!

So the "Shotgun" style of delivery is very self defeating!

 

Fly Safe!

Cheers.

[turboplanner]

Some 20 years ago I had an experience with "shotgun Sally" at Bankstown.

I often comment here about the need for a pilot to learn the correct phrases for Australia, and get up to speed with where to use them.

Bankstown and Moorabbin are like joining a spin drier with a whole lot of aircrtaft going round the circuits, othere arriving and others and the only ones stationary are those waiting to take off anf those doing full stops. All the others have to judge their slots for the aircraft and radio. It can be a daunting task flying in without some prior experience. I haven't experienced a tower shotgun, but plenty of pilots trying to get their transmission out of the way, not realising that no one can transmit over them anyway. One of the nandy hints from one CFI when I was delaying my tutn to suit the radio "turn" call, was if the radio is full make the turn at the correct point, then call after. By far the best lesson I had was to go up in the tower for an hour with the controllers, and see what they see, and see what they need us to do. I saw some not making any calls at all and the ATC guy following them with a pair of binoculars, and realising I wasn't so bad after all.

[Jerry_Atrick]

I understand that ATC have a responsible job where a stuff-up could cost them their career and in bad stuff-ups, their freedom (at least in some countries), so that when things are busy and a pilot does something non-standard or downwright stupid, their levels of frustration will rise quicker than a helium balloon escaping the clutches of a kid's hand. But they should be trained (and I am sure they are) not to berate a pilot on air no matter how bad the stuff up. As @Geoff_H, experience showed, it causes the pilot to doubt and second guess themselves and withdraw from communication presumably when no one wants that and also becomes a safety issue. That same FISO at Elstree that berated me for saying ready to take-off versus ready to depart, gave a student returning from a solo a diatribe of what I would call abuse for not getting something right. Screaming over the radio while calling the student everything under the sun - and that was what he was doing - when the situation was urgent but not imminently a safety issue is a sure-fire way to take teh student's focus away from the task at hand rather than on it. Someone complained the the CAA and he was instructed to take a remedial course of some sort is what I was later told.

 

Pilots don't know what ATC is going through at the time; but similarly, ATC don't know what's going on in the cockpit at the time, either. Although we are told to communicate issues, there is a natural tendency not to do so unless it is really urgent to save face or not be seen to not have control or whatever. Certainly, in the PPL syllabus, there was not much about maintaining calmness and the avoidance of letting frustration get the better of oneself when communicating over the air (have heard pilots bicker amongst themsleves).. For ATC, there should be, if there is not already, a system where a review of such events (or the useless shotgun/rapid-fire talking) take place and a discussion with the controller of the importance of correcting their ways.

 

Over here, ATC and FISOs are obliged to fill out a mandatory obeservation report when a pilot is alleged to have breached a rule and materially impacted safety. The CAA then contacts the pilot and notifies them of the report and asks them to to give their sid of the story. Often, no action was taken, but if action was taken, it was usually in the form of remedial online training. Although politics have diminished what was a very good system, the outcome of learning from mistakes has to be better than causing people to potentially hang up their headsets - or worse.

[facthunter]

After sitting at the threshold for an unusualy long time . I asked the tower did they know the reason for the delay,( so I could inform the PAX AND I was chewing fuel as well. ) Latter part not mentioned.

Out of the blue came "People like You are the problem" That was a RAAF tower but I regard that as a poor show indeed from anyone. Nev.

[Flightrite]

After sitting at the threshold for an unusualy long time . I asked the tower did they know the reason for the delay,( so I could inform the PAX AND I was chewing fuel as well. ) Latter part not mentioned.

Out of the blue came "People like You are the problem" That was a RAAF tower but I regard that as a poor show indeed from anyone. Nev.

 

Very poor form! I always found Melb & Brissy not very helpful either! At Brissy we would be sitting at A3 RWY 19 (no L& R then) waiting, not an A/C n sight!

[facthunter]

I just don't believe getting "Personal" is very classy or even permitted. US flying types are supposed to be COOL DUDES under pressure and behave in a "professional" manner at all times. You're not supposed to have BAD days. BAD days (emotionally) and good decisions are not things that go together. Don't bring your other problems into the cockpit . Nev